


took the wrong step years ago

by lucyjaggat



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Gen, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-27
Updated: 2015-12-27
Packaged: 2018-05-09 16:05:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5546621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucyjaggat/pseuds/lucyjaggat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It occurred to Ren later that he could have just shoved the girl off the cliff. He tried not to think about that fact again, but when he lay awake reviewing his mistakes, it was pretty high on the list. He wondered why he didn’t even think to drop the lightsaber and let gravity do it for him. If she lost her footing, it would almost be like he wasn’t to blame. I defeated her with the Force, he would recount later, triumphantly. No one would even be alive to contradict him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	took the wrong step years ago

It occurred to Ren later that he could have just shoved the girl off the cliff. He tried not to think about that fact again, but when he lay awake reviewing his mistakes, it was pretty high on the list. He wondered why he didn’t even think to drop the lightsaber and let gravity do it for him. If she lost her footing, it would almost be like he wasn’t to blame. I defeated her with the Force, he would recount later, triumphantly. No one would even be alive to contradict him. 

He never meant to do it. He intended it all along. It was an accident and a calculation. He was to blame. He was just a small part in a fierce machine. Han was standing too close. His thumb slipped. He acted on reflex. 

Ren still didn’t know, in the end, if he really meant it. His father’s touch seemed to sear his face like a brand, long after Han tumbled into death. Han was weak and foolish. Ren wouldn’t be like him. 

It was like his life was just an uncontrollable downhill slide, always too close, too fast, too hungry. And that instead of catching his breath, he just shook himself off after each collision and simply resolved to dive still deeper.

He wanted to be a weapon, fiery and lethal. A saber thrust reaching from his grandfather’s grave to strike down all who would oppose his mission. A cog, set in motion, with no weaknesses and no responsibilities beyond his role as a Force-shaped blaster directed at Snoke’s enemies. A gear didn’t share the guilt of the device. A gear was beautiful in its precision. It didn’t fail. It didn’t doubt.

He thought about the girl. He thought about her often. He imagined that she must be on her way to Luke Skywalker by now, growing stronger than Ren with every passing second. Sometimes he dreamed about her killing him, and woke up with his hands pressed over an imagined wound to the heart. Did Han have time to feel pain when Ren speared him through? He had certainly had time to lift his hand and scald Ren with the weight of his regard. Ren didn’t know what he wanted to be true, or what was worse: that Han died in pain and afraid or that Han died loving him. 

The girl, again. Why did he offer to teach her? Just like everything else he did, he could never quite find the root of his motivations. He still didn’t know if he had meant it. He couldn’t imagine why she hadn’t taken the opportunity to kill him, instead choosing to stand over him with her brows drawn together in a familiar rage, all the more powerful in its righteousness. And that was the sting of it, really. Ren was never really able to reconcile the amazing feats of the Light with the power of the Dark side. It seemed like in the end, Light kept winning. Goodness was simple, as easy and instinctual as taking a breath. The difficult path, in truth, was what he had chosen.

There was little chance that she wasn’t connected to him beyond the unifying power of the Force. The way her lightsaber, rightfully his, flew so smoothly to her infuriated him with every recall. She was stronger and had acquired her strength through her loneliness in the same way Ren was weakened by his. As a child, Ren had felt that he would never be able to live up to the legends of Luke Skywalker, Leia Organa, and Han Solo. It had never occurred to him in his childish fits of jealousy that a younger heir to the family legacy would be his undoing. He still couldn’t believe how thoroughly she had turned his mental probe against him. The girl had riffled through his thoughts as easily and effortlessly as if she were scavenging the ruins of his soul for scraps to hurt him with. 

He closed his eyes. The healing he had to undergo as he journeyed to meet with the Supreme Leader was thorough, but the scars lingered and still ached. His face would be forever marred, a badge reminding everyone who saw it of his inadequacies. When he saw the girl again, she would account for this. In this, like nothing else, Ren had little doubt. If he couldn’t get her to become his student, and have that power under his control, then the next best thing was to snuff her light out like sand kicked gracelessly over a flame. Then he would be free. He tried to conjure up her face in pain, imagining how he would revel in his victory, but instead found himself wondering what she looked like at peace.

He felt a sudden, horrible and sharp longing to know what her smile would look like, scattering like sunlight on the elegant lines of her face. He instantly dismissed this ridiculous whim, full of the tendency toward sentiment that he was trying so hard to rid himself of. Clearly, killing Han Solo hadn’t been enough if Ren still felt the cloying, cajoling call of the Light. 

Desperate to sleep, he imagined an ocean. He could see the island.


End file.
